Foreign Policy: Munich Versus Vietnam

Whereas Munich is about universalism, about taking care of the world and the lives of others, the Vietnam analogy—so prevalent following our overreach in Iraq—is domestic in spirit. It’s about taking care of one’s own: 58,000 American dead is the critical fact for those who hold “Vietnam” over your head. The wielders of the Vietnam analogy look back to the early decades of the Republic, to a continental nation protected by seas from an older and less tractable world. They summon forth the words of John Quincy Adams, that America should be “the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all,” but “the champion and vindicator only of her own.” The best of the Vietnam crowd are mindful of how tragedy is avoided by thinking tragically. They are haters of incessant fervor. They know just how wrong things can go. They worry about investing too much national prestige and treasure in one particular area.

The Vietnam analogy thrives following national trauma. For realism is not exciting. It is respected only after the seeming lack of it has made a situation demonstrably worse. As someone labeled a realist in the 1990s, who nevertheless supported the Iraq War out of intimate knowledge of Saddam’s brutality, I can’t help but respect the wisdom of those who opposed it.

Yet those opposed to Iraq should be careful about taking the Vietnam analogy too far. Vietnam can be an invitation to isolationism, just as it is to appeasement. Remember that the Munich Conference itself occurred only 20 years after the mass death of World War I,  making European politicians like Chamberlain hell-bent on avoiding another conflict. Such situations are perfectly suited for the machinations of a tyrannical state that knows no such fears. To wit, the disaster in Iraq should say little—one way or the other—about how we should think about, and respond to, the dangers posed by a nuclear Iran.

As the division between Republicans and Democrats on foreign policy grows more indistinct, it may be replaced by a Munich-Vietnam division. Because of the ongoing problem of rogue states with awful human rights records, Munich may stage a recovery. The Munich crowd is a configuration of aggressive liberal internationalists and neoconservative interventionists—the alliance that sought action early-on in Bosnia in the 1990s. The Vietnam crowd constitutes the old-fashioned realists that span both parties.

Vietnam is about limits; Munich about overcoming them. Each analogy on its own can be dangerous. It is only when both are given equal measure that the right policy has the best chance to emerge. For wise policymakers, while aware of their nation’s limitations, know that the art of statesmanship is about working as close to the edge as possible, without stepping over the brink.